The Strangest Things

Last night, after adding a heavy dose of cardamom to my coffee, I tumbled into a psychedelic fit regarding those ...

Last night, after adding a heavy dose of cardamom to my coffee, I tumbled into a psychedelic fit regarding those anemic shoegazing soul-searchers in Longwave. Though I was previously unable to ascertain exactly why this band is being hailed as "visionary" (amongst other hyperbolic nonsense) in the greater music press, or even what the band seems to be aiming for on a just being-a-band level, the hackneyed early Radiohead/U2 pseudo stylings of Longwave became less hermetically locked to me in this state. I got it. I got them. It was an unexpected revelation. I was momentarily able to look past Longwave's soporific dullness-- and my own ensuing boredom and anger regarding the band's meteoric rise to mediocrity-- to figure out why they needed to exist in 2003.

Before I returned to reality, the blissful effects of the cardamom took me to Brandon, age 14, when I, a clueless skater with Flock-of-Seagulls hair, proudly brought an Ocean Blue cassette into school and showed it off to my comparative history teacher who was really into The Smiths. The following week-- barely time enough to absorb their powerful work!-- I couldn't understand why he thought they were so slight. Fuck me! Even as he explained his response by analyzing their weak lyrics, derivative sound, and cultural plundering in relation to Morrissey and his jangly guitar-toting sidekick, I thought, "He just doesn't get it, the old goat." In that frame of mind, Longwave rule. But more importantly: Longwave are The Ocean Blue for our new dark age.

Longwave formed in 1999, ostensibly to carry a pale, whimpering torch for men with Brooklyn perms the world over. They even boast two ex-residents of Rochester-- Mike James, the wiry haired drummer, and Steve Schlitz, a singing valedictorian who opens his eyes and mouth as wide as Billie Joe as he belts out banalities ("Tidalwave" actually sounds like Green Day's "Good Riddance [Time of Your Life]")-- performing a stiff simulation of rocking out in the mannequin-heavy video for "Everywhere You Turn". The most interesting thing about Longwave is that two of their members grew up working in the factories of Kodak, that great manufacturer of images.

Surprisingly, The Strangest Things isn't their first album. After listening to it seven or eight times I guessed it was some kind of studio invention to cash in on the aesthetic numbness of the rock revival, but shockingly, such anesthetic college rock actually emerges from people with day jobs, too. It's like you're a young artist growing up away from the evils of the city and instinctively you make a series of advertisements for Absolut Vodka. I guess it happens? Longwave's first album, Endsongs, came out in 2000 on Luna Sea Records, an imprint started by the owner of New York City's Luna Lounge. There was also an EP, Day Sleeper, on Fenway, a self-released EP, and a bunch of RCA-related singles. Both Day Sleeper and the new album were recorded by Dave Fridmann at Tarbox Road Studio, who, despite helping to mold the sounds of The Flaming Lips and Mercury Rev in the not-so-distant past, is slipping a bit these days, working with artless hacks like Ed Harcourt and Phantom Planet, presumably in the name of easy cheddar.

I've tried my best not to judge Longwave on their connections to The Strokes. After all, it does make sense that if you tour with a band, they might help you secure a record deal. What's more troubling is that a posse of four with about the same rock 'n' roll power as The Dave Matthews Band could get passed off as even kind of important in some pretty major, supposedly insightful music publications (CMJ has lost all remaining credibility-- as if it had much left, I guess-- by awarding The Strangest Things album of the day. That's right: of the day. Sigh).

Okay, the music. There was a moment during my first year at college that I ran into a bunch of people heavily into My Bloody Valentine, Lush, Ride, Slowdive, Swervedriver, and other bands in stripped Gap t-shirts who fell into the general Shoegazing genre: mostly pasty English (or Anglophilic) guys and girls with bowl haircuts playing dreamy, droning feedback, singing whispery in the background. Musically, that's Longwave, though their vocals are mixed in a much higher, more radio-accessible style that reveals every flaw of the vague, melodramatic lyrics.

The cascading guitars of "Wake Me When It's Over" plod into the single, "Everywhere You Turn", which is admittedly catchy, but sounds eerily similar to Mr. Mister's equally catchy diptych of "Broken Wings" and "Kyrie". It's destined to be a favorite at weddings everywhere. Even grandma kicks it, asking you if it's a Strokes B-side, as she gets drunk on table wine.

Longwave's lyrics remind you that valedictorians are sometimes just booksmart. "Exit" boasts an image that might've shown up in Ethan Hawke's deliriously bad first novel The Hottest State: "Little thing/ What are you going to do?/ I'm drawn into your big black pool/ It comes in waves, it comes in waves/ And the waves could pull me in." The icier "Meet Me at the Bottom", also obsessed with orifices, finds Schlitz "slipping through your every crack." Yikes?

Though cardamom hits fast (like an atom bomb!), the high doesn't last. When I jumped out of bed in the morning, reaching for my notebook, I was chagrined to realize that I hadn't written down a single thing during those spice-induced moments of clarity. Man oh man, doubly screwed! Not only was I embarrassed that a standard cooking spice took me on a strange Christmas Carol trip to my past, now I no longer understood the need for Longwave. I guess, really, I just always felt comfortable in my thinking that one Toad The Wet Sprocket was more than enough to fulfill a specific emotional and intellectual niche. Am I wrong?